Herschel Krustofsky was born to Jewish parents and grew up in the Lower East Side of Springfield. His father, respected Rabbi Hyman Krustofsky, came from a long line of rabbis, looking for his son to follow in his footsteps. Hyman forbade his son from becoming a clown, but Herschel continued anyway, getting his first laughs at his Yeshiva impersonating his father. His father continued to try and discourage his son, by taking away his props, such as his seltzer bottle.

Despite his perseverance at comedy, he was top of his Yeshiva class. He received his comedy break though entertaining the Rabbis at the Talmudic conference. Wearing clown make-up to hide his appearance, he is well received by the crowd, making balloon sculptures of the Menorah and the Star of David. However, when someone sprays water over his face, his identity is revealed, much to the dismay of his father, who disowns him. He never had a Bar Mitzvah.

After this, Krusty moved to Tupelo, Mississippi, where he worked as a street mime. His first TV appearance was in the 1950s on "The Milk of Magnesia Summer Cavalcade", pretending to be a Russian satellite. However, he said the word "Pants" which got him banned from TV for 10 years. He then got another chance on "Laugh-In", but got stuck behind the shutter doors, putting his career back another 22 years...

"A Tale of Two Springfields" is the second episode of season 12 and is the 250th episode of the series overall in both broadcast and production order. It originally aired in November 5, 2000. It is written by John Swartzwelder and directed by Shaun Cashman. The Who guest-starred as themselves, except for Pete Townshend.

While calling Animal Control over a badger taking residence in Santa's Little Helper's doghouse, Homer discovers that Springfield has two different area codes—and ends up leading a revolt that splits the town in two.

While feeding Santa's Little Helper, Bart finds a badger in his doghouse. Bart and Lisa try to get rid of it themselves, but are unsuccessful. After Homer suggests they blow up the doghouse with dynamite, Lisa tells him to call Animal Control instead. When Homer calls them, he gets a tri-tone and a recording indicating that he did not enter the correct area code. Marge informs him that the phone company ran out of telephone numbers, so they had to split Springfield into two area codes.

One half keeps the old 636 and the Simpsons' half get the new 939. Homer is outraged that they changed the code without warning (even though Lenny and Carl say that they had weeks of advance warnings, including two weeks at area code camp)...

Ted Nugent is an American guitarist and activist, as well as a former presidential candidate.

Nugent made phone calls telling people to vote no on a proposition that would prevent crossbows in schools. He argued that it was the children's only defense against charging elk.

After Homer became a huge star, the Springfield Republican Party selected Homer to choose the new President candidate. After deciding against the politicians they chose for him, Homer went for Ted Nugent. He appeared on Homer's show, Gut Check with Homer Simpson, and was at the front of the Gravy Boat Movement with Homer. Lisa was opposed to this and she opposed everything that he wanted. Homer later decided that he couldn't endorse Nugent after talking to his family. He then sang twosongs...